Virtual Impax

Effective Strategic Digital Marketing

Marketing Magic

Who owns your web site?

by

Yet another less for the “Web Based Horror Stories” file.

Way back in 2003, Bill (not his real name) hired a company to create a web presence for his brand new business. Bill wasn’t real web savvy, so he was grateful when his developer took care of everything for him. His web developer registered the desired domain name for him, built the site and hosted it for him. All was well for a while…. then, Bill wanted to make changes to his site.  He called, he emailed, he wrote but his requests to his web developer went unreturned and unacknowledged.

As his frustration mounted, he took a class with my colleague. My colleague offers teleseminars on web marketing and during the class Bill learned about Word Press blogs. He learned that with a self-hosted Word Press blog that he could have it all. He could have an attractive web presence that was easy to update and maintain without having to contact his web developer every time he wanted to add content or change current content on his web site.

He contacted his web developer. He wanted to move his site.  He wanted to use the same domain he had been using for years to promote his business and he wanted to use key images as well.  That is when his horror story began.

Bill’s web developer replied quickly to this request.  The web developer informed Bill that he didn’t own the copyright to the site, they did. (Intellectual property must be transferred in writing and since Bill never signed a development contract with the web developer, they were right. It was still technically THEIR web site.)

More bad news, the helpful developer had registered the domain name in THEIR name. Not only did Bill not own the web site he’d paid to have developed, he didn’t own the domain name either. The four year old domain name could have provided a nice launch pad for Bill’s new blog… but he didn’t own or have rights to the domain name.

Believe me, I UNDERSTAND the temptation to just register everything in my name . It would be SO much easier not only for me, but for the client as well. However, it’s times like these when I want to point out to MY clients why I “force” them to go through the indignities of registering their own domain name.

Bill finds himself starting from scratch all over again with the whole web development process. His content… lost. His domain name… was never his.

Who owns your web site?  Who is listed as the administrative contact on YOUR domain name?  Did you sign a contract with your web developer?  Does it transfer ownership of the content of your site to you in writing?

I’ve heard it said that business savvy is acquired through experience.  Why is it that experience is most instructive when it’s most DESTRUCTIVE?

If I knew then what I know now….

by

The first day of the year is a great time to reflect upon the past and plan for the future.

Cory on the “Internet Wonders” blog writes…

If we had only known that niche marketing would become so infectiously popular, then we would have concentrated on this approach rather than waste time with MLM.  If only we had known that Google was going to shift algorithms and AdWords would establish new rules, we could have…

Cory’s right to admonish the reader (as well as himself) to stop right there.

It’s hard to predict what the , though many try to do just that.  Usually, good predictions are remembered while the bad just seem to fade away!

Ten years ago, things were quite different on the web than they are today.  Web sites were almost universally coded in HTML.  Connections were slow…. interactivity was minimal… and if you wanted to watch a video, you’d click on a link to download it to your PC and then go to bed.  If you were lucky, when you woke up 8 hours later, the download MIGHT be finished.

Today, the internet is filled with web sites trying to find favor with the Google gods.  For those who weren’t on the web a decade ago, the masses used to dance, sing and sway trying to find favor with deities of the day named Yahoo, Alta Vista and Lycos.

From Hyperpeople: Mob Rules: Chaos

“The world has changed.  The world is changing.  The world will change a whole lot more.”

One thing of which I’m certain is that ten years from now, things will be a lot different than they are now.    We’ll look back at 2007 and say, “Who knew?”  Will it be some current upstart dethroning Google?  Will it be the implosion of “social networking”?

I can’t predict the future and I won’t even try.  All I can do is share what has worked in the past for me and my clients is to create web sites (whether they be blogs or static sites) is to create a web presence with the VISITOR in mind.  No matter who sits atop the search engine throne, the one thing all search engines have in common is seeking out the BEST content for their visitor.

As my 2008 gift, I share with you a philosophy which has served me very well over the past decade:

  1. Create your web presence with the search engines in mind.
  2. Make it easy for the search engines to include your site in their index.
  3. Create compelling content with your VISITOR (not the search engines) in mind.
  4. Promote your web presence like the search engines do NOT exist.

Here’s wishing you a year that is prosperous and full of health!

Make like a scout and be prepared….

by

Last month, as I was writing the content for my monthly newsletter, I saw an opportunity for a colleague of mine.

I met John when he began working with a web client of mine on my client’s PR campaign. It was a wonderful experience. While John is a Havard grad and I’m only a Manchester College alum, we both are preaching the same message from different pulpits. John preaches his message and guides clients to garner what he calls “earned media coverage.” I, on the other hand, preach my message of targeting your audience via paid media coverage and the web.

In the meantime, I have ANOTHER client who is doing everything “right” in her quest for achieving “I’ll be a guest on Oprah some day.” Her efforts are in STARK contrast to the small business owner who contacted me a couple of months ago. While my client is making a significant investment in not only money but also time in preparing her marketing materials, this wanna be Oprah guest was adamantly opposed to spending more than the tiniest portion of time AND money to achieve her goal.

So, I wrote a newsletter about my observations on the subject. “Do your marketing goals include appearing on Oprah“. Because, I have had clients who have “broken through” and been featured on nationally televised shows and each of those clients have told me it was their professional appearing web site PLUS that web site’s search engine friendliness that got the ball rolling for them. [Read more…] about Make like a scout and be prepared….

On the web, experience could be your worst enemy.

by

J. Paul Getty once said, “In times of rapid change, experience could be your worst enemy.”

Climbing Blogging SuccessThe other day, I was on the phone with a client when he told me, “I get complimented all the time on how “ahead of the curve” I am with my blog, but truth be told, I’m just following you. ” Later in the conversation, we began talking about his former web developer, to which he said, “He’s just satisfied making HTML web sites. The thing is, I don’t know of anyone who has made the jump from HTML web sites to blogs like you have.”

In times of rapid change, experience can be your worst enemy.

I wish I could say that I “saw” the explosive growth of blogging coming and jumped onto that bandwagon. I didn’t. I was literally FORCED into blogging by a client of mine.

Last year (December 2006) I published my first book, Beyond the Niche: Essential Tools You Need to Create Marketing Messages that Deliver Results. Unfortunately, I began writing the book in March 2005. By March 2006, I began to recognize that the book was NEVER going to happen if I didn’t clear some “emotional clutter” that kept getting in my way. I hired one of my clients at the time to help guide me.

Ernie Moore was a long time client and I knew he was the one to get me moving forward on my book project. Ernie suggested that I launch a blog to help build “buzz” for the book.

My response: “UGH! Blogs are for people who DO NOT KNOW how to code in HTML!”

Blogging opportunityHowever, Ernie was relentless (That’s what a coach is supposed to do!) and wouldn’t let me off the hook. Despite the fact that I had a perfectly good HTML web site waiting to promote my book (Find My Niche.com) I purchased a domain name and launched Beyond Niche Marketing to promote my book.

It took my blog 9 months to emerge from the Google Sandbox, which fortunately just happened to be just a month after my book was published. Last June I ran the log files for both sites and was STUNNED at what I saw. The blog gets 10X+ the number of unique visitors the HTML site gets. VISITORS!!! Not hits… VISITORS! Those visitors also tend to return time and time again.
The reasons the blog site is SO much more popular than the HTML site include:

  • It’s so easy to add a post (a.k.a. FRESH CONTENT) that I do it more often there than I do the HTML site.
  • More content = more opportunities to appear in searches
  • Blogs make it easy to trade links with other blog site owners (increasing PR and authority of the site).
  • The Semilogic theme and plug ins make the site very attractive to the search engines.

The thing is, looking back the development/promotion of HTML site, I worked HARD to get the PR up to 3. HARD! Meanwhile, the rise of the blog site to a PR 4 was positively EFFORTLESS in comparison.

Thus my “conversion” from an HTML web developer to a blog FANATIC.

“In times of rapid change, experience could be your worst enemy.”

Don’t let experience be your worst enemy!

Matters of marketing and ethics…

by

Rich Schefren has a post on his blog called “I don’t think we can be friends anymore.” In it, he describes his impressions of a recent “internet marketing seminar”

There were 16 speakers, many of whom were clients of mine. It was an impressive lineup of self made entrepreneurs who got to their current position by learning, thinking, working hard, and marketing even harder.

Yet table rush after table rush were for so-called “short-cuts” like Private Label Rights Products, Push Button Software, and you just sit at home and get rich while my company does all the hard work for you type products.

On the one hand… the “learn more, think fast, work hard, market harder and smarter” mantra is NOT great “bait” for attracting throngs of attendees to your internet marketing seminar. Typical human beings (of which I am one) would much rather “get rich quickly and easily” …. oh, and I’ll take e a set of “washboard abs” which come from taking a pill while you’re at it!

So most of these “marketing gurus” have a problem. They can honestly tell their audience what it takes to be successful.. WHAT THEY HAVE DONE TO BE SUCCESSFUL… (time… talent…plus working harder AND smarter) or they can sell a “secret shortcut”.

Like I said… great “bait” is essential to attracting attention. I created just such bait when I wrote and article titled “Why the best marketing tactics have failed you up until now.” The article was picked up by SEVERAL newsletters and my phone began ringing off the hook with “opportunity seekers”. I remember one call in particular from a gentleman late one Friday night. I have no idea what time zone he was in, but he began peppering me with questions from the start.

“How much should I be paying for hosting?” he asked.

“Um, that would depend upon what kind of web site you’re running.” I replied. “Asking me how much hosting SHOULD cost is like asking me how much a house SHOULD cost. A house with 11 rooms and an ocean view is going to cost more than a 1 room shack with a view of a landfill.”

That was obviously good enough for him. “Fine. I want you to host my web site.” he said. “What kind of products oo you offer for me to sell.”

That comment triggered a flash back to a conversation with a woman who came to me for help a few years ago. She had attended an internet marketing “get rich quick” seminar and had paid $8,000 up front for a fool proof “web marketing system”. To her surprise, it wasn’t working. People weren’t flocking to her site and they most certainly weren’t purchasing the products she had listed for sale (via affiliate links) on the site.

In her case, I began outlining the traditional “steps” of successful internet marketing: learn more, think fast, work hard, market harder and smarter. She almost broke into tears as I outlined a way for her to salvage her $8K web venture. It involved posting articles to the site three-five times a week, launching a newsletter and building an audience. She obviously wasn’t prepared to do that. She thought she had paid her life savings to obtain a short cut.

So when the gentleman on the phone began asking me what products I offered for him to sell on his web site, I politely explained to him that I specialize in working with business owners who already have a product or service. I didn’t think it was possible, but he sounded even more heartbroken than the woman I had disappointed years earlier with my dose of “reality”.

Neither of those people became clients, though I knew EXACTLY what it would have taken to get them to sign up and I wish I could say I’ve only had two people come to me wanting just such a “hands free… you do the work, I’ll collect the cash” kind of set up. However, one thing that’s nice is that when I delivered my “bad news” and the person on the other end of the phone says, “DUH! I knew I was going to have to work to make money,” well… then I know I have a TRUE potential client on the phone. They’re as rare as gemstones… and I treasure each and every one of them.